𝖕𝖆𝖗𝖆𝖓𝖔𝖗𝖒𝖆𝖑 || 𝘀. 𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘁𝗼𝗻

S4E6: The Dive

It feels like a surge of blood attempts to force its way into my heart too fast. "Fuck," I breathe out.

"We encourage anyone with information to please come forward."

"Oh man," Steve mumbles. "This is not good. Really not good."

I run my hand through my hair. "Fuck."

"You've got a lot of questions, and I'm going to answer as many as I can," Powell says. "Two o'clock at town hall, where anyone from the Hawkins community is welcome. But right now, I've got work to do, and I appreciate your understanding."

"Dustin, can you hear me? Y/l/n?" Eddie's voice comes from the Supercom in Dustin's bag.

Dustin gets it out quickly, pulling the antenna out. "Eddie. Holy shit." We follow Dustin away from the scene. "Are you okay?"

"Nah, man. Pretty... Pretty goddamn far from okay."

"Eddie, where are you?" I ask.

"Skull Rock. Do you know it?"

"Uh, yeah. That's near Cornwallis and..."

"Garrett, yeah," Steve finishes for Dustin. "I know where that is."

"Hold tight," Dustin says. "We're coming. We're coming."

✶

Dustin claims he's going the right way, but Steve thinks otherwise. Dustin leads us on our hike to Skull Rock, his compass in one hand, map in the other. I have no clue which way we're supposed to be going because I've never been there before. Hopefully we aren't going to get too lost. I'd like to at least find Eddie before it gets dark.

"Dude, I'm telling you, you're taking us the wrong way," Steve says.

"It's north. I'm positive." Dustin holds up his map. "I checked the map."

"You do realize it's Skull Rock, it's a super popular make-out spot?"

Dustin checks his compass again. "Yeah. So?"

"Yeah, well, it wasn't popular until I made it popular. All right? I practically invented it."

I roll my eyes, thinking back to Steve's douchebag days. It doesn't surprise me one bit that he started that trend.

"We're heading in the wrong direction," Steve insists, diverging from our path and forging his own down a small slope.

"Steve," Dustin whines. "Where are you going? Steve!"

"Stop whining." He motions for us to follow. "Let's go. Trust me."

I hang back with Robin and Nancy.

"Oh my God, they're so adorable," Robin says, talking about Lucas and Max, who walk a ways ahead of us. "I just wanna squeeze 'em."

"I know!" I say dramatically. "Lumax, are you kidding me? Young love is adorable."

Robin scrunches her face up. "I think it'd be Mucas."

"Ew, that's gross." Nancy laughs. "I vote Lumax."

"Two to one. Lumax wins," I say. "Speaking of young love how are you and Jonathan?" I ask Nancy, bumping my shoulder into hers. "Are you guys going to meet up soon or anything?"

She tenses at the mention of him. A barrier builds around her right before my eyes. "Jonathan and I are fine."

"That's... good." I take the hint and drop the subject.

"We're good," she says.

I nod. "Right."

"It's just..." she relaxes. "He was supposed to be here for the break, and then he backed out at the last minute for some vague, mumbly Jonathan reason. And, to be honest, I'm not that surprised because I've been feeling him pulling away. And I don't know if it's because we're 2,000 miles away or if he met someone new or what. And now I can't find out why because apparently he's blown up his family's house phone or something."